Tomorrow
by Miss Mockingbird
Summary: Oneshot. A troubled boy slips past Jane's defences, and Lisbon contemplates her feelings for him. Jisbon if you squint. My first Mentalist fic!


**A/N: A little onshot idea walked into my head & refused to leave. First Mentalist fic, reviews much appreciated!**

**Disclaimer: I don't own the Mentalist, that privilage belongs to Bruno Heller & CBS. I wish I did though (: Jake & Ellie belong to me.**

He wouldn't even meet her eye. The grey stared listlessly into the desk, the green appealingly at his pallid face. Try as she might, Lisbon couldn't even coax a reaction from him – let alone a statement. It wasn't that he was disobedient; merely that he didn't trust any of them as far as he could kick them. The fact that he was a seven year old, and they were all adults, left much to be desired in the kicking aspect.

His social worker, Melanie, stood by the door. She was pleasant enough, Lisbon thought. However, her voice had permanently adopted the tone of one speaking to an impatient child, and Lisbon felt as though she was constantly being patronised.

Lisbon eventually gave in, and strode silently from the room, nodding to Melanie, who began escorting Jake from the CBI headquarters.

"Tomorrow." it was more a statement then a question.

Lisbon felt drained. It was these cases that were the hardest. The kid knew – she was sure. He just wasn't going to say anything out of fear. Lisbon recognised the emotions behind his guarded eyes – she'd been there herself, though not the extent poor Jake had endured.

Jane met her outside the interview room, and the two walked in silence to the bullpen, Jane smart enough to hold his tongue, for once.

"Let me try." he appealed as they reached her office door.

She turned, eyeing the consultant. He looked genuine enough – there wasn't a hidden agenda behind his Mona Lisa smile, he simply wanted to help.

She sighed, "Ok, Jane. But please, no hypnosis. Not this time." More than anything she wanted the kid to recover naturally, to heal fully, without any artificial emotions. She knew, from experience, this could be the only way out.

She was sure Jane heard the hidden plea in her words as he nodded and called "_Tomorrow._" over his suited shoulder.

**

Lisbon waited patiently outside the interview room, the two-way mirror breaking the space between her and Jake.

Jane arrived promptly and, in his fashion, drew a chair to the table.

"You're mother is dead, Jake. I know you're angry that he killed her. I know you're mad as hell, Jake."

Lisbon recoiled silently at the bluntness of Jane's words. But Jake finally reacted, and the grey eyes finally met the blue.

"I know you know who killed her, Jake. And you're safe from him. You and Ellie are safe now. But we can't help you catch him, and get justice for her, unless you help us."

Jane's voice was smooth, reassuring. He poked and prodded around the edges of Jake's defences, reading the kid like a novel. He elicited responses that Lisbon needed desperately, and had been trying for three days to obtain. Jake, in turn, opened himself up to Jane, the grey eyes searching for some sincerity in Jane's words.

The session lasted just under an hour and by the end of it Jake and Jane appeared – not to be friends; that would be far too fanciful – instead they appeared united by some common thread. Lisbon was impressed but not unnecessarily concerned by this. She hoped Jane wasn't putting ideas into the kid's head.

Melanie smiled nonchalantly at Lisbon as she took Jake's hand to lead him out of the building. When Jane arrived at Lisbon's side Melanie was suddenly aglow, and proffered a girlish wave. Jane smiled back charmingly and waved childishly at the pair.

Jake suddenly stopped and asked, in a carrying voice, to nobody in particular, "Tomorrow?"

Melanie smiled back at Jane, who smiled at Jake, who tilted his lips crookedly.

Lisbon, who admittedly felt rather unappreciated, couldn't help but grinning at the scene.

**

And so it was that Jake and Jane met the following day, Jake no longer confined to the interview room (Lisbon had all she needed in collaborating evidence and other statements to arrest the guy), and was instead allowed to sit beside Jane on his precious sofa.

Lisbon observed them quietly all through the day – the little lost boy finding solace in a broken man. She wondered how much solace, if any, the broken man found in the little boy. She was drawn to the two of them, Jane's unusual way of dealing with children made him irresistible to them, and the sudden cracks in the walls he built around himself (consequential of his newfound friendship with Jake) drew _Lisbon_ irresistibly to him.

She found herself wondering if perhaps, he might stop being broken one day. The Mona Lisa smile that played so often on his lips might become less superficial, and perhaps the armour that hid his eyes would fall. _For her?_

Over the tomorrow's that passed Lisbon reflected on this prospect. Her brain and her heart lived in separate worlds. The road between was wrecked and overgrown with protocol, and their pasts, and the fact the odds seemed, to her at least, non-existent.

But her heart remained stoic. Just beneath her chest she felt a dull ache, a little pang, that for too long she couldn't place. She assumed his outward charm and overall attractive demeanour drew her, and so many other women, inexplicably towards him. And then the pang became constant, niggling at her, a quiet little ache she tried to run from, scared perhaps of rejection, or simply unable to find her way down that wrecked and overgrown road.

And so she watched Jane's defence's fall, his eyes opened by this little boy, sure that each found solace in the other. To her Jake was hope – hope that one day, one tomorrow, she could look at Jane, look at him truly, hindered by nothing, hidden by nothing, her heart naked, her eyes unmasked. And perhaps he would truly look at her.

Blue eyes would meet the green, and solace, understated in its sincerity, but unmistakeably apparent, would exist between them.

"_Tomorrow_." she promised herself.

A/N: A bit of a character study on Lisbon...but with a backstory? I dunno, hope you enjoyed (:


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